Ioanna V. Papathanasiou

Communication in Nursing Practice

Good communication between nurses and patients is essential for the successful outcome of individualized nursing care of each patient. To achieve this, however, nurses must understand and help their patients, demonstrating courtesy, kindness and sincerity. Also they should devote time to the patient to communicate with the necessary confidentiality, and must not forget that this communication includes persons who surround the sick person, which is why the language of communication should be understood by all those involved in it. Good communication also is not only based on the physical abilities of nurses, but also on education and experience.

Health Based Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and their Applications.

Medical researches as well as the study of the Earth’s surface, better still, geography are interlinked with each other; their relationship dates from antiquity. The science of Geographic Information Systems and, by extension, Geomatics engineering belongs to a discipline which is constantly developing at a global level. This sector has many applications regarding medical / epidemiological research and generally, the social sciences. Furthermore, this discipline may act as a decision making tool in the healthcare sector and it might contribute to the formulation of policies into the healthcare sector. The use of GIS so as to solve public health issues has an exponential increase and has been vital to the understanding and treatment of health problems in different geographic areas. In recent years, the use of various information technology services and software has lead health professionals to work more effectively.

Critical thinking: the development of an essential skill for nursing students.

Critical thinking is defined as the mental process of actively and skillfully perception, analysis, synthesis and evaluation of collected information through observation, experience and communication that leads to a decision for action. In nursing education there is frequent reference to critical thinking and to the significance that it has in daily clinical nursing practice. Nursing clinical instructors know that students face difficulties in making decisions related to clinical practice. The main critical thinking skills in which nursing students should be exercised during their studies are critical analysis, introductory and concluding justification, valid conclusion, distinguish of facts and opinions, evaluation the credibility of information sources, clarification of concepts and recognition of conditions. Specific behaviors are essentials for enhancing critical thinking. Nursing students in order to learn and apply critical thinking should develop independence of thought, fairness, perspicacity in personal and social level, humility, spiritual courage, integrity, perseverance, self-confidence, interest for research and curiosity. Critical thinking is an essential process for the safe, efficient and skillful nursing practice. The nursing education programs should adopt attitudes that promote critical thinking and mobilize the skills of critical reasoning.

A literature review on stress and coping strategies in nursing students

Abstract Background: While stress is gaining attention as an important subject of research in nursing literature, coping strategies, as an important construct, has never been comprehensively reviewed. Aim: The aims of this review were: (1) to identify the level of stress, its sources, and (2) to explore coping methods used by student nurses during nursing education. Methods: This is a systematic review of studies conducted from 2000 to 2015 on stress and coping strategies in nursing students. CINAHL, MEDLINE, PsycINFO and PubMed were the primary databases for the search of literature. Keywords including “stress”, “coping strategy”, “nursing students” and “clinical practice” in 13 studies met the criteria. Findings: Stress levels in nursing students range from moderate to high. Main stressors identified included stress through the caring of patients, assignments and workloads, and negative interactions with staff and faculty. Common coping strategies utilized by nursing students included problem-solving strategies such as developing objectives to resolve problems, adopting various strategies to solve problems, and finding the meaning of stressful events. Conclusion: Nurse educators may consider the use of formulation and implementation of empirically tested interventions to reduce stress while enhancing coping skills.

Work-related Mental Consequences: Implications of Burnout on Mental Health Status Among Health Care Providers

Introduction: Burnout can create problems in every aspect of individual’s’ human life. It may have an adverse effect on interpersonal and family relations and can lead to a general negative attitude towards life. Aim: The purpose of this study is to investigate whether burnout is associated with the mental health status of health care providers. Material and Methods: The sample in this study consisted of 240 health care employees. The Greek version of Maslach’s Burnout Inventory (MBI) was used for measuring burnout levels and the Greek version of the Symptoms Rating Scale for Depression and Anxiety (SRSDA) questionnaire was used to evaluate health care providers’ mental health status. Descriptive statistics were initially generated for sample characteristics. Normality was checked by the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and data was processed with parametric tests. General linear models with MBI dimensions as independent variables and SRSDA subscales as dependent variables were used to determine the relation between burnout and mental health status. Statistics were processed with SPSS v. 17.0 (SPSS, Chicago, IL, USA). Statistical significance was set at p=0.05. Results: The average age of the sample is 40.00±7.95 years. Regarding gender the percentage of men is 21.40% (N=49) and of women is 78.60% (N=180). Overall the professional burnout of health care workers is moderate. The mean score for emotional exhaustion is 26.41, for personal accomplishment 36.70 and for depersonalization 9.81. The mean for each subscale of SRSDA is 8.23±6.79 for Depression Beck-21, 3.96±4.26 for Depression Beck-13, 4.91±4.44 for Melancholia, 6.32±4.35 for Asthenia and 6.36±4.72 for Anxiety. The results of general linear models with the MBI dimensions as independent variables and the SRSDA subscales as dependent variables are shown that emotional exhaustion and personal accomplishment are statistically correlated with all subscales of SRSDA, while depersonalization is not correlated with any SRSDA subscale. Conclusions: Burnout appears to implicate mental health status of healthcare providers in work index. Emotional exhaustion is the burnout dimension that is correlated the most with employees’ mental health.

Motivation, leadership, empowerment and confidence: their relation with nurses' burnout.

Introduction: Burnout is usually defined as a state of physical, emotional and mental exhaustion that results from long-term involvement in work situations that are emotionally demanding. A great deal of researches has been devoted to the understanding of factors contributing to burnout and the negative effects that burnout has in the cost and the quality of the provided healthcare. Discussion: Many researchers believe that in difficult and stressful working conditions the work environment should be changed in order to reduce burnout levels successfully. Indeed, recent studies have highlighted the role of human resources management in burnout. It has been widely recognized that human resource management policies should be at the core of any sustainable solution that aims to increase health care systems performance and efficient. Conclusion: Motivation, leadership, empowerment and confidence are very important factors that should be considered in this direction because they are strongly related with burnout levels.

General Satisfaction Among Healthcare Workers: Differences Between Employees in Medical and Mental Health Sector.

Background: General satisfaction is a personal experience and sources of satisfaction or dissatisfaction vary between professional groups. General satisfaction is usually related with work settings, work performance and mental health status. Aim: The purpose of this research study was to investigate the level of general satisfaction of health care workers and to examine whether there were any differences among employees of medical and mental health sector. Methods: The sample consisted of employees from the medical and mental health sector, who were all randomly selected. A two-part questionnaire was used to collect data. The first section involved demographic information and the second part was a General Satisfaction Questionnaire (GSQ). The statistical analysis of data was performed using the software package 19.0 for Windows. Descriptive statistics were initially generated for sample characteristics. All data exhibited normal distributions and thus the parametric t-test was used to compare mean scores between the two health sectors. P values < 0.05 were defined as reflecting the acceptable level of statistical significance. Results: 457 healthcare workers completed the questionnaire. The mean age of the sample was 41.8 ± 7.9 years. The Cronbach alpha coefficient for GSQ was 0.79. The total mean score of general satisfaction for the employees in medical sector was 4.5 (5=very satisfied) and for the employees in mental health sector is 4.8. T-test showed that these results are statistical different (t=4.55, p<0.01) and therefore the two groups of healthcare workers feel different general satisfaction. Conclusions: Mental health employees appear to experience higher levels of general satisfaction and mainly they experience higher satisfaction from family roles, life and sexual life, emotional state and relations with patients.

INTEGRATING CHRONIC KIDNEY DISEASE PATIENT’S SPIRITUALITY IN THEIR CARE: HEALTH BENEFITS AND RESEARCH PERSPECTIVES

Introduction: Patients who suffer from chronic renal disease face problems in many aspects of their life; problems such as physical and social as well as mental such as stress, anxiety, depression. In addition, they exhibit an amount of spiritual needs, which relate and influence the psychological adaptation to the illness. Aim: The aim of this article is to examine evidence from the international literature regarding the possible relation of spirituality and health outcomes, mostly in the complex codex of a chronic and life treathing disease such as CKD. Results: Spirituality is a very debatable issue and the term has no single and widely agreed definition. The key components of spirituality were ‘meaning’, ‘hope’, ‘relatedness/connectedness’, and ‘beliefs/beliefs systems’. Spirituality has been characterized as the quest for meaning in life, mainly through experiences and expressions of mind, in a unique and dynamic process different for each individual. For many individuals spirituality and religion are important aspects of their existence, constituting a source support contribute to wellbeing and coping with life’s daily difficulties. Conclusion: Considering, assessing and addressing chronic kidney disease patient’s spirituality and spiritual needs is necessary and it can have a positive outcome in health related quality of life, mental health and life expectancy.

Psychological Distress and Resilience in Women Diagnosed with Breast Cancer in Greece

Background: Breast cancer is the most frequent type of cancer among women worldwide, especially in developed countries. To be diagnosed with breast cancer and undergo cancer treatment can be a very stressful event. It is estimated that one-third of cancer patients are dealing with psychological problems, such as anxiety and depression and resilience is a way of coping and overcome life stressors such cancer diagnosis. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine resilience in women diagnosed with breast cancer and its association with depression and anxiety. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted, 144 women diagnosed with breast cancer answered a questionnaire consisted of four parts: Sociodemographic data, the Patient Health Questionnaire Two-Item Depression Scale, the Generalized Anxiety Disorder Questionnaire and the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale 25. Results: The majority of the sample belongs to age group 51- 60 years, with the mean age of 53.5 SD±11.7 years. The 59.5% of patients were residents of an urban area, 56.8% were married and 36.5% has 2 children. The mean value of CD-RISC25 was 65.3 SD±17.9, meaning a moderate resilience of cancer patients. The 54.5% of respondents indicated a depressed mood. The anxiety severity measured with the GAD-2, where the mean was 2.1 and 46.8% of patients suffered from high anxiety. Conclusions: According to our results, resilience can negative influence depressive symptomatology. Moreover, lower levels of depression can lead to fewer anxiety symptoms.

The Translation, Validation and Cultural Adaptation of Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy - Spiritual Well-being 12 (facit-sp12) Scale in Greek Language -

Background: According to World Health Organization (WHO), spirituality is an important domain of quality of life especially in terminal, life threatens chronic diseases. For many people spirituality and religion are not just very important dimensions of their existence, but also a source of support that contributes to wellbeing and coping with everyday difficulties of life. Aim: Aim of the study was the translation of the Facit Spiritual Well Being Scale (Facit-Sp12) in Greek language and the validation of the scale for the Greek population. Material and Methods: The Facit-Sp12 questionnaire is an anonymous self-administered questionnaire that contains twelve, four point Likert scale, closed questions (0=Not at all, 1=A little bit, 2=Some-what, 3=Quite a bit, 4=Very Much). The questionnaire was translated into Greek language and then back translated in the English in order to be checked for any inconsistencies. The sample of the study was 183 chronic kidney disease patients, undergoing hemodialysis. Exploratory factor analysis, with principal components analysis with Varimax rotation was performed for checking the construct validity of the questionnaire. The test–retest reliability and the internal consistency were also examined. Statistical analysis performed by the use of SPSS 21.0. Statistical significance level was set at p=0.05 Results: The final Greek version of the questionnaire includes all of the twelve questions. The mean age of the participants was 61.81±13.9. Three factors were exported from the statistical analysis. The Cronbach-α coefficient was 0.77 for the total questionnaire and for each subscale was 0.70 for “meaning”, 0.73 for “peace” and 0.87 for “faith”. Between the three subscales “meaning” had the highest score (mean 12.49, SD=2.865). Conclusions: The Facit Spiritual Wellbeing Scale–Facit-Sp12, is a valuable and reliable questionnaire of three dimensions that can be used for assessing spirituality and spiritual wellbeing in Greek population.